


Fall Into Me (I'll Catch You)

by clotpolesonly



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Beta Laura Hale, Control Issues, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Insecure Jackson Whittemore, Laura Hale is Good With Feelings, Post-Season/Series 02, Resurrected Laura Hale, Werewolf Jackson Whittemore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:40:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26667601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clotpolesonly/pseuds/clotpolesonly
Summary: “Just, try it one more time,” Laura said with a sigh. “Breathe in deeply and—”“Shouldn’t Derek be teaching me all this?” Jackson cut in. “He’s the alpha, isn’t he?”Raising an eyebrow, Laura said, “Do youwantDerek to be teaching you?”Jackson made a face.“I didn’t think so.”
Relationships: Laura Hale & Jackson Whittemore
Kudos: 38
Collections: Laura Hale Appreciation Week 2020





	Fall Into Me (I'll Catch You)

**Author's Note:**

> moooore Jackson & Laura, for reasons!!! the last one was fluffy but i got feels in this one XD for LHAW's dealer's choice day.

“This is fucking stupid.”

Laura rolled her eyes. “ _You’re_ fucking stupid.”

Jackson scowled at her, eyes still glowing blue because he couldn’t figure out how to turn them off despite Laura’s coaching. “Oh, yeah, that’s very mature. Thanks.”

“I never made any claims to maturity,” Laura pointed out. “And you’re welcome.”

A growl burst out of Jackson. It seemed to take him by surprise. He transferred his scowl to his own hands where his claws still wouldn’t retract. He’d been trying to shake them for ten minutes already. Laura’s advice to breathe and relax had achieved nothing, since apparently Jackson was categorically incapable of relaxing.

“Just, try it one more time,” Laura said with a sigh. “Breathe in deeply and—”

“Shouldn’t Derek be teaching me all this?” Jackson cut in. “He’s the alpha, isn’t he?”

Raising an eyebrow, Laura said, “Do you _want_ Derek to be teaching you?”

Jackson made a face.

“I didn’t think so.”

Laura leaned back in her chair, arms crossing. Jackson mirrored her, legs akimbo and foot tapping. His eyes flickered out and they both immediately looked to his hands, but the claws stayed put. Another growl forced its way out, accompanied by a sudden burst of hair along the sides of Jackson’s face. The further slip of control only made him more frustrated. His eyes lit up again.

“I was the alpha first, you know,” Laura said quickly. “Before Derek. Before Peter, even. I was the alpha for six years before I...well, you know.”

Before she got ripped to pieces. Before the power was stolen from her by someone she had loved and trusted. Before she had spent several weeks beyond the metaphorical veil, screaming for someone to hear her until someone actually _had._ Before Lydia had dragged her back to the land of the living through some esoteric ritual that none of them could identify, not even Deaton.

Jackson’s bright blue glare found her. His chest was heaving, growing agitation warring with a desperate bid for control that wouldn’t come. As she watched, Jackson’s face shifted before snapping back into place. He squeezed his eyes shut, claws digging into his thighs until they drew blood.

“Must suck,” he forced out. “Getting downgraded. Losing all that power.”

“Power has its downsides. I think you’re figuring that out.”

Jackson growled in annoyance, but when he opened his eyes, they were grey again. “You don’t say.”

He was trying _too hard._ Derek had been the same way when he was in high school, once the teenage hormones kicked in and fucked everything up. Mantras weren’t working, and breathing exercises only pissed him off more. What he needed was a distraction.

Laura leaned forward, elbows on her knees, until Jackson met her gaze directly. “Frankly,” she said, “being the alpha sucks.”

A strangled laugh forced its way past Jackson’s fangs. “Seriously? People literally kill for that power.”

“Uh, _yeah,_ ” Laura said. She thought her judgmental tone was warranted, considering she _had_ been literally killed for it, and he knew it. “That’s one of the reasons it sucks. Being a werewolf in a world full of hunters is already dangerous enough without an _extra_ target on your back, this one from your own kind.”

Jackson conceded the point with a waggle of his head, but the reminder of their precarious circumstances didn’t seem to relax him any. Go figure.

“I hated being the alpha,” Laura told him. “It’s...stressful, being the one responsible for other people’s lives. The only reason I regret losing the power is because now my little brother has to live with it instead. He wasn’t trained for it like I was.”

That got Jackson’s attention. “Trained for it?”

“Oh yeah,” Laura said, a twist of old bitterness in her tone. “I was raised to be the next alpha. Whether I wanted to be or not. The dubious privilege of the alpha’s firstborn.”

Jackson shook his head. “I can’t imagine not _wanting_ power.” He was still breathing hard, fists clenched tightly. He was grey-eyed again, though, and looking at Laura like she was something foreign.

She looked back steadily and said, “That’s because you’ve never truly had it.”

He looked away. His palms, when he pried his fists open, were bloody. Since his pants were already bloodstained and full of claw holes, he scrubbed his hands down his thighs to clean them as best he could. They were shaking.

Laura said his name. It took him a few seconds to raise his head, but he’d lost the sideburns by the time he did. He would’ve looked normal if not for how red and wet his eyes were.

“Just tell me that I won’t hurt them,” he said. “ _Please._ ”

Laura hadn’t been around long enough to know Jackson very well. Hell, she’d only been out of the ground for a little over two weeks; she barely knew _any_ of them. But from everything the others had told her about him, she would never have expected to hear that word come out of his mouth, and especially not to hear it crack under the weight of emotion behind it.

She took his hand in hers, uncaring of the blood still staining the creases. “Listen to me,” she said softly. “You _can_ manage this.”

“How?”

“Well, for one, you have to start by believing that you don’t _want_ to hurt them.”

Jackson’s hand twitched in hers, like he’d just stopped himself from pulling away. “Of course I don’t _want_ to hurt them. Why do you think I’m even here? Why would I—”

“I think that you still see yourself as the monster that you were,” Laura said, “instead of as the person that you are.”

The words hit hard. She could see it in the way he flinched, hear it in the sudden uptick of his heartbeat, feel it in the clench of his fingers around hers. She didn’t let him pull away and she didn’t let him avert his eyes.

“As long as you’re afraid of yourself, you’ll always be fighting against your nature,” she said. “And the more you fight it, the harder it will be to control. This is a _part_ of you now, Jackson. You have to accept that.”

Since she wasn’t giving up his hand, he used the other to wipe the wetness from his eyes. “How the fuck am I supposed to do that?”

“Well, personally, I always start with some deep breathing exercises.”

The look of pure disbelief and exasperation that statement engendered was the funniest thing she’d seen since she’d crawled out of her grave. Her laughter was probably inappropriate, considering the circumstances, but Laura had always been a big fan of inappropriate laughter.

“I’m sorry,” she said through her giggles. “I’m really sorry, I just— You’re taking this whole thing way too seriously. You needed to lighten up a bit.”

“I’m trying to learn how to _not_ lose control of myself and accidentally murder my parents or my friends,” Jackson reminded her.

“I know. And the first step towards that goal is that you can’t be so afraid of failure.”

Jackson gave her another of those looks, like she was utterly incomprehensible. “I can if my failure will get people hurt. _Again._ ”

“I know,” Laura repeated. “And that’s why you’re here, with me. Because I’m someone you can’t hurt, Jackson. You may think you’re the big man on campus,” she said with a teasing grin that earned her a huff of offense, “but I’m older, stronger, faster, and more experienced. Here, in this room, you have to trust that I will be able to keep you under control, even if you lose control of yourself.”

Jackson stared at her for a long few seconds, grey eyes roving her face for any sign of weakness or deceit. “Promise?”

She gave his hand a squeeze and said, “I won’t let you hurt anyone, Jackson. I promise.”

After a moment’s hesitation, he squeezed back.

**Author's Note:**

> [rebloggable on tumblr!](https://clotpolesonly.tumblr.com/post/630352575677579264/fall-into-me-ill-catch-you)


End file.
